Lynas Fiasco

Regular readers of my blog will know that I am no eco-mentalist. I have some serious reservations about environmental issues. However, I do opinions about this whole Lynas issue after today’s rally has shown that there are a lot of noisy Malaysians who want the plant out of the country.

Personally, I think that this issue is being handled very badly by both the government and also Lynas. For one, Lynas must understand that the problem isn’t a technical one. So, no amount of scientific and technical facts are going to persuade the people of the plant’s safety.

Even if the government parades a string of experts and Lynas lines up a host of international endorsements, it is not going to work. The Lynas PR people must understand that the problem is that our government has lost the trust of these people. Unless you can get the Pope to endorse you, you’re not going to win this.

This is the crisis that our country is slowly falling into today – large swaths of our people have lost trust in the government. I cannot blame them though, since our senior government officials and cabinet members have been caught in lies far too often. With each lie, they lose credibility.

That is why I think that our government needs to hold an election soon – to prove that they’ve got the mandate to rule. However, before they do that, they need to learn to manage the issues better and to stop small issues from ballooning into fiascos of national proportions.

While we can argue over the size of the protest groups today, one thing is clear. The groups that oppose the issue are certainly larger than the best that those supporting the issue could muster. Therein lies the problem. The ruling elite have lost the mob. The people are slowly taking to the streets.

They must do something to get back the mob.

Handing out cash no longer works. Giving students RM200, poor RM500, bonuses etc may have worked in the past but the trick loses effectiveness after being used too often. These people need to learn some new tricks but I doubt that they have the capacity to. Malaysians are sick of reruns.

I will venture that the people are not going to give up the fight. However, the government isn’t about to give in either after investing so much money in it already. Lynas isn’t going to go away soon either as it has sunk too much into this project as well.

So, what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object? Something has got to give.

Under normal circumstances, I would say that the people do not stand a chance of winning against the combined might of a multi-national corporation and the government. However, it’s election year and anything is possible. Wishes can get granted this year, though temporarily.

If this rare earth plant can generate so much resistance, I wonder how would a nuclear plant fare. I can guarantee you of this – nuclear power is coming to Malaysia. It’s inevitable. Our hydrocarbons will run out. Power demands will grow. Nuclear is our clear and best answer to the energy problem currently.

The people know that nuclear energy is safe. What they do not trust are the people running the plant.

Our society is damaged if we can’t even trust ourselves.

Sigh.

Time to sleep.

Smash Musical

Just realised that the main role is played by Katherine McPhee – an American Idol Season 5 Finalist who didn’t win. Just goes to show that you don’t need to win to be a winner.

Siamese Bumiputera

What a pack of lies and if any Siamese in Malaysia thinks it is true, I’d really like to know what they’ve been smokin’.

According to Bernama, our PM said that, “the government has recognised the Siamese community as a bumiputera group in the country and will ensure the community is accorded the same privileges enjoyed by their other bumiputera counterparts.”

What a load of crock!

Unless I am sorely misinformed, there has not been any amendments to our Consti to enlarge the definition of Bumiputera in Malaysia, which is defined in Article 161 of our Consti. In fact, our PM doesn’t claim that there has been any amendments to the Consti either in the article.

Our PM is either misinformed, lying or delusional. I don’t know which is better, or worse.

I hope that the Siamese community are not fooled by this. Whether or not they have a claim for Bumiputera rights is not my issue here. My issue is that unless and until our Consti is amended to expand the definition of Bumiputera, the Siamese community still do not have any claim to being ‘sons of the soil’.

Our PM does not have the power to include more people into the Bumiputera family, regardless of how he feels about it. If he is truly sincere in doing this for the Siamese community, he should table an amendment of the Consti to expand the definitions for Bumiputera.

I’m sorry. You’ve been had.

PS: Plus I think that we’re still in a state of emergency, regardless of what the PM says. I don’t think that the bill has passed the Senate yet.

Forces Spéciale

I went in with little expectation, expecting this to be just another shooter with lots of people dying and one man against the horde scenes. At first I didn’t notice that the film was in French as I could read the text, but I soon realised this after noticing that the actors’ voices were wrong.

As my expectations weren’t much to begin with, I didn’t think too much of it as I was just looking for a 2-hour escape from work, after spending the whole morning cleaning up the office and catching up with my monthly accounts.

But then, I exited the cinema with tears in my eyes. The film turned out to be surprisingly good. My only gripe is that it wasn’t in French. I hate dubbing as it kills the original emotions. Plus, the dialogue loses much of it’s meaning in translation.

At the end, while people were walking out of the cinema hall, I was busy reading the epilogue – the film was dedicated to all the soldiers buried in Afghanistan and also the reporters who risked their lives bringing us the story.

Damn. It’s good.

PS: It would have been better in French!

Musical Mind

Darn.. this tune’s in my head most of yesterday. I like Adam Levine’s voice.

I blame this on too much musical TV. I’ve been watching Glee and Smash a lot recently. Following The Voice doesn’t help much either. I watch them all on Hulu.

Smash is a tv-series about making a Broadway musical and they’re singing original music. Glee is about a high-school club singing covers of popular songs. The Voice is a vocal talent competition. How much more musical can something like this get?

Mathai Sings

I’m possessed by this song. I’ve been hearing it in my head the whole day.

Media: Postal Voters?

I just read the article in TheStar, which inter alia said that the Election Commission (EC) has agreed to allow media personnel to register as postal voters and that there were provisions in the law that allowed media practitioners to be postal voters.

What provisions?

Unless the election regulations had been amended recently to include media personnel, they are most certainly not covered by the regulations. In fact, while I was clearly covered under the regulations, I was still denied my democratic right to vote, as I had evidenced to the PSC last year.

Is this a case of the EC acting ultra vires and doing whatever it pleases? It wouldn’t surprise me the least if they did because they are denying hard-working Malaysians overseas their constitutional right to vote.

Opening the polling station earlier so that emergency personnel can vote early is one thing. Giving people the right to postal vote when they are not mentioned in the law, and denying others the right to do the same because they are not mentioned in the law, is just illegal.

I honestly don’t know what to say about this.

Agreeing on principle to allow media personnel to become postal voters is one thing. Being legally allowed to do so is quite another. Like I said, unless the specific rules had been amended to include media personnel, the EC is possibly acting ultra vires beyond their powers and authority.

Something is screwed up.